benjamin translator

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alterSELECTED WRITINGSVOLUME 11913-1926Edited byMarcus Bullockand Michael W Jennings

THE BELKNAP PRESS OFHARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESSCambridge, Massachusettslondon, England \ "' I


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Copyright 1996 by the President and Fellows of Harvard CollegeAll rights reservedPrinted in the United States of AmericaSecond printing, 1997

This work is a translation of selections from Walter Benjamin, Gesammelte Schriften, unter Mitwirkung/Jon Theodor Iv. Adorno und Gershom Scholem, herausgegeben /Jon Rolf Tiedemann und HermannSchweppenhiiuser, copyright 197;l. 1974, 1977, 1982, 1985. 1989 by Suhrkamp Verlag. "The Task ofthe Translator" originally appeared in English in Walter Benjamin, Illuminations, edited by HannahArendt, English translation copyright 1968 by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc. "On Language as Suchand the Language of Man," "Fate and Character," "Critique of ViolencJ';" "Naples," and "One-WayStreet" originally appeared in English in Walter Benjamin, Reflections. English translation copyright 1978 by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc. Published by arrangement with Harcourt Brace Jovanovich,Inc. "One-Way Street" also appeared in Walter Benjamin, "One- Way Street" and Other Writings (Lon-don: NLBNerso, 1979, 1985). "Socrates" and "On the Program of the Coming Philosophy" originallyappeared in English in The Philosophical Forum 15, nos. 1-2 (1983-1984).Publication of this book has been aided by a grant from Inter N ationes, Bonn.Frontispiece: Walter Benjamin, Paris, 1927. Photo by Germaine Krull. Collection Gary Smith, Berlin.Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication DataBenjamin, Walter, 1892-1940. [Selections. English. 1996] Selected writings I Walter Benjamin; edited by Marcus Bullock and Michael W. Jennings. p. em."This work is a translation of selections from Walter Benjamin, Gesamrnelte Schriften . . .copyright 1972 . by Suhrkamp Verlag"-T.p. verso.Includes index.Contents: v. 1. 1913-1926.ISBN 0--674--94585-9 (v. 1: alk. paper)I. Bullock, Marcus Paul, 1944- . II. Jennings, Michael William. III. Title.PT2603.E455A26 1996838'.91209-


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The Task of the Translator

In the appreciation of a work of art or an art form, consideration of thereceiver never proves fruitful. Not only is any reference to a particular publicor its representatives misleading, but even the concept of an "ideal" receiveris detrimental in the theoretical consideration of art, since all it posits is theexistence and nature of man as such. Art, in the same way, posits man'sphysical and spiritual existence, but in none of its works is it concerned withhis attentiveness. No poem is intended for the reader, no picture for thebeholder, no symphony for the audience.

Is a translation meant for readers who do not understand the original?This would seem to explain adequately the fact that the translation and theoriginal have very different standing in the realm of art. Moreover, it seemsto be the only conceivable reason for saying "the same thing" over again.For what does a literary work "say"? What does it communicate? It "tells"very little to those who understand it. Its essential quality is not communi-cation or the imparting of information. Yet any translation that intends toperform a transmitting function cannot transmit anything but communica-tion-hence, something inessential. This is the hallmark of bad translations.But do we not generally regard that which lies beyond communication in aliterary work-and even a poor translator will admit that this is its essentialsubstance-as the unfathomable, the mysterious, the "poetic"? And is thisnot something that a translator can reproduce only if he is also-a poet?Such, actually, is the cause of another characteristic of inferior translation,which consequently we may define as the inaccurate transmission of aninessential content. Whenever a translation undertakes to serve the reader,it demonstrates this. However, if it were intended for the reader, the same


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254 The Task of the Translatorwould have to apply to the original. If the original does not exist for thereader's sake, how could the translation be understood on the basis of thispremise?

Translation is a form. To comprehend it as a form, one must go back tothe original, for the laws governing the translation lie within the original,contained in the issue of its translatability. The question of whether a workis translatable has a dual meaning. Either: Will an adequate translator everbe found among the totality of its readers? Or, more pertinently: Does itsnature lend itself to translation and, therefore, in view of the significance ofthis form, call for it? In principle, the first question can be decided onlycontingently; the second, however, apodictically. Only superficial thinkingwill deny the independent meaning of the latter question and declare bothto be of equal significance. It should be pointed out in refutation of suchthinking that certain correlative concepts retain their meaning, and possiblytheir foremost significance, if they are not from the outset used exclusivelywith reference to man. One might, for example, speak of an unforgettablelife or moment even if all men had forgotten it. If the nature of such a lifeor moment required that it be un forgotten, that predicate would imply nota falsehood but merely a claim unfulfilled by men, and probably also areference to a realm in which it is fulfilled: God's remembrance. Analogously,the translatability of linguistic creations ought to be considered even if menshould prove unable to translate them. Given a strict concept of translation,would they not really be translatable to some degree? The question as towhether the translation of certain linguistic creations is called for ought tobe posed in this sense. For this thought is valid here: If translation is a form,translatability must be an essential feature of certain works.Translatability is an essential quality of certain works, which is not to saythat it is essential for the works themselves that they be translated; i t means,rather, that a specific significance inherent in the original manifests itself inits translatability. It is evident that no translation, however good it may be,can have any significance as regards the original. Nonetheless, it does standin the closest relationship to the original by virtue of the original's translat-ability; in fact, this connection is all the closer since it is no longer ofimportance to the original. We may call this connection a natural one, or,more specifically, a vital one. Just as the manifestations of life are intimatelyconnected with the phenomenon of life without being of importance to it,a translation issues from the original-not so much from its life as from itsafterlife. For a translation comes later than the original, and since theimportant works of world literature never find their chosen translators atthe time of their origin, their translation marks their stage of continued life.The idea of life and afterlife in works of art should be regarded with anentirely unmetaphorical objectivity. Even in times of narrowly prejudicedthought, there was an inkling that life was not limited to organic corpore-


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The Task of the Translator 255ality. But it cannot be a matter of extending its dominion under the feeblescepter of the soul, as Fechner tried to do, or, conversely, of basing itsdefinition on the even less conclusive factors of animality, such as sensation,which characterizes life only occasionally. The concept of life is given its dueonly if everything that has a history of its own, and is not merely the settingfor history, is credited with life. In the final analysis, the range of life mustbe determined by the standpoint of history rather than that of nature, leastof all by such tenuous factors as sensation and soul. The philosopher's taskconsists in comprehending all of natural life through the more encompassinglife of history. And indeed, isn't the afterlife of works of art far easier torecognize than that of living creatures? The history of the great works ofart tells us about their descent from prior models, their realization in theage of the artist, and what in principle should be their eternal afterlife insucceeding generations. Where this last manifests itself, it is called fame.Translations that are more than transmissions of subject matter come intobeing when a work, in the course of its survival, has reached the age of itsfame. Contrary, therefore, to the claims of bad translators, such translationsdo not so much serve the works as owe their existence to it. In them thelife of the originals attains its latest, continually renewed, and most completeunfolding.As the unfolding of a special and high form of life, this process is governedby a special high purposiveness. The relationship between life and pur-posiveness, seemingly obvious yet almost beyond the grasp of the intellect,reveals itself only if the ultimate purpose toward which all the individualpurposivenesses of life tends is sought not in its own sphere but in a higherone. All purposeful manifestations of life, including their very purposiveness,in the final analysis have their end not in life but in the expression of itsnature, in the representation of its significance. Translation thus ultimatelyserves the purpose of expressing the innermost relationship of languages toour answer. It cannot possibly reveal or establish this hidden relationshipitself; but it can represent it by realizing it in embryonic or intensive form.This representing of something signified through an attempt at establishingit in embryo is of so singular a nature that it is rarely met with in the sphereof nonlinguistic life. In its analogies and symbols, it can draw on other waysof suggesting meaning than intensive-that is, anticipative, intimating-realization. As for the posited innermost kinship of languages, it is markedby a peculiar convergence. This special kinship holds because languages arenot strangers to one another, but are, a priori and apart from all historicalrelationships, interrelated in what they want to express.

With this attempt at an explication, our study appears to rejoin, afterfutile detours, the traditional theory of translation. I f the kinship of lan-guages is to be demonstrated by translations, how else can this be done butby conveying the form and meaning of the original as accurately as possible?


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256 The Task of the TranslatorTo be sure, that theory would be hard put to define the nature of thisaccuracy and therefore could shed no light on what is important in atranslation. Actually, however, the kinship of languages is brought out bya translation far more profoundly and clearly than in the superficial andindefinable similarity of two works of literature. To grasp the genuinerelationship between an original and a translation requires an investigationanalogous in its intention to the argument by which a critique of cognitionwould have to prove the impossibility of a theory of imitation. In the latter,it is a question of showing that in cognition there could be no objectivity,not even a claim to it, if this were to consist in imitations of the real; in theformer, one can demonstrate that no translation would be possible if in itsultimate essence it strove for likeness to the original. For in its afterlifewhich could not be called that if it were not a transformation and a renewalof something living-the original undergoes a change. Even words with fixedmeaning can undergo a maturing process. The obvious tendentiousness ofa writer's literary style may in time wither away, only to give rise toimmanent tendencies in the literary creation. What sounded fresh once maysound hackneyed later; what was once current may someday sound archaic.To seek the essence of such changes, as well as the equally constant changesin meaning, in the subjectivity of posterity rather than in the very life of. language and its works would mean-even allowing for the crudest psychologism-confusing the root cause of a thing with its essence. Moreprecisely, it would mean denying, by an impotence of thought, one of themost powerful and fruitful historical processes. And even if one tried to turnan author's last stroke of the pen into the coup de grace of his work, thisstill would not save that dead theory of translation. For just as the tenorand the significance of the great works of literature undergo a completetransformation over the centuries, the mother tongue of the translator istransformed as well. While a poet's words endure in his own language, eventhe greatest translation is destined to become part of the growth of its ownlanguage and eventually to perish with its renewal. Translation is so farremoved from being the sterile equation of two dead languages that of allliterary forms it is the one charged with the special mission of watching overthe maturing process of the original language and the birth pangs of its own.

If the kinship of languages manifests itself in translations, this is notaccomplished through the vague resemblance a copy bears to the originaLIt stands to reason that resemblance does not necessarily appear where thereis kinship. The concept of "kinship" as used here is in accord with its morerestricted usage: it cannot be defined adequately by an identity of originbetween the two cases, although in defining the more restricted usage theconcept of "origin" remains indispensable. Where should one look to showthe kinship of two languages, setting aside any historical connection? Certainly not in the similarity between works of literature or in the words they


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The Task of the Translator 257use. Rather, all suprahistorical kinship between languages consists in this:in every one of them as a whole, one and the same thing is meant. Yet thisone thing is achievable not by any single language but only by the totalityof their intentions supplementing one another: the pure language. Whereasall individual elements of foreign languages-words, sentences, associa-tions-are mutually exclusive, these languages supplement one another intheir intentions. This law is one of the fundamental principles in the phi-losophy of language, but to understand it precisely we must draw a distinc-tion, in the concept of "intention," between what is meant and the way ofmeaning it. In the words Brnt and pain, what is meant is the same, but theway of meaning it is not. This difference in the way of meaning permits theword Brot to mean something other to a German than what the word painmeans to a Frenchman, so that these words are not interchangeable forthem; in fact, they strive to exclude each other. As to what is meant,however, the two words signify the very same thing. Even though the wayof meaning in these two words is in such conflict, it supplements itself ineach of the two languages from which the words are derived; to be morespecific, the way of meaning in them is supplemented in its relation to whatis meant. In the individual, unsupplemented languages, what is meant isnever found in relative independence, as in individual words or sentences;rather, it is in a constant state of flux-until it is able to emerge as the purelanguage from the harmony of all the various ways of meaning. If, however,these languages continue to grow in this way until the messianic end of theirhistory, it is translation that catches fire from the eternal life of the worksand the perpetually renewed life of language; for it is translation that keepsputting the hallowed growth of languages to the test: How far removed istheir hidden meaning from revelation? How close can it be brought by theknowledge of this remoteness?

This, to be sure, is ro admit that all translation is only a somewhatprovisional way of coming to terms with the foreignness of languages. Aninstant and final rather than a temporary and provisional solution to thisforeignness remains out of the reach of mankind; at any rate, it eludes anydirect attempt. Indirectly, however, the growth of religions ripens the hiddenseed into a higher development of language. Although translation, unlikeart, cannot claim permanence for its products, its goal is undeniably a final,conclusive, decisive stage of all linguistic creation. In translation the originalrises into a higher and purer linguistic air, as it were. It cannot live therepermanently, to be sure; neither can it reach that level in every aspect of thework. Yet in a singularly impressive manner, it at least points the way tothis region: the predestined, hitherto inaccessible realm of reconciliation andfulfillment of languages. The original cannot enter there in its entirety, butwhat does appear in this region is that element in a translation which goesbeyond transmittal of subject matter. This nucleus is best defined as that


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258 The Task of the Translatorelement in the translation which does not lend itself to a further translation.Though one may glean as much of that subject matter as one can from atranslation, and translate that, the element with which the efforts of the realtranslation were concerned remains at a quite inaccessible remove, becausethe relationship between content and language is quite different in theoriginal and the translation. Whereas content and language form a certainunity in the original, like a fruit and its skin, the language of the translationenvelops its content like a royal robe with ample folds. For it signifies amore exalted language than its own and thus remains unsuited to its content,overpowering and alien. This disjunction prevents translation and at thesame time makes it superfluous. For any translation of a work originatingin a specific stage of linguistic history represents, in regard to a specific aspectof its content, translation into all other languages. Thus, ironically, transla-tion transplants the original into a more definitive linguistic realm, since itcan no longer be displaced by a secondary rendering. The original can onlybe raised there anew and at other points of time. I t is no mere coincidencethat the word "ironic" here brings the Romantics to mind. They, more thanany others, were gifted with an insight into the life of literary works-aninsight for which translation provides the highest testimony. To be sure, theyhardly recognized translation in this sense, but devoted their entire attentionto criticism-another, if lesser, factor in the continued life of literary works.But even though the Romantics virtually ignored translation in their theo-retical writings, their own great translations testify to their sense of theessential nature and the dignity of this literary mode. There is abundantevidence that this sense is not necessarily most pronounced in a poet; in fact,he may be least open to it. Not even literary history suggests the traditionalnotion that great poets have been eminent translators and lesser poets havebeen indifferent translators. A number of the most eminent ones, such asLuther, Voss, and Schlegel, are incomparably more important as translatorsthan as creative writers; some of the great among them, such as Holderlinand Stefan George, cannot be simply subsumed as poets, and quite particu-larly not if we consider them as translators. Just as translation is a form ofits own, so, too, may the task of the translator be regarded as distinct andclearly differentiated from the task of the poet.The task of the translator consists in finding the particular intentiontoward the target language which produces in that language the echo of theoriginal. This is a feature of translation that basically differentiates it fromthe poet's work, because the intention of the latter is never directed towardthe language as such, at its totality, but is aimed solely and immediately atspecific linguistic contextual aspects. Unlike a work of literature, translationfinds itself not in the center of the language forest but on the outside facingthe wooded ridge; it calls into it without entering, aiming at that single spotwhere the echo is able to give, in its own language, the reverberation of the


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The Task of the Translator 259work in the alien one. Not only does the intention of a translation addressor differ from that of a literary work-namely a language as a whole, takingan individual work in an alien language as a point of departure-but it isalso qualitatively different altogether. The intention of the poet is spontane-ous, primary, manifest; that of the translator is derivative, ultimate, idea-tional. For the great motif of integrating many tongues into one true lan-guage informs his work. This language is that in which the independentsentences, works of literature, and critical judgments will never communi-cate-for they remain dependent on translation; but in it the languagesthemselves, supplemented and reconciled in their way of meaning, drawtogether. If there is such a thing as a language of truth, a tensionless andeven silent depository of the ultimate secrets for which all thought strives,then this language of truth is-the true language. And this very language,in whose divination and description lies the only perfection for which aphilosopher can hope, is concealed in concentrated fashion in translations.There is no muse of philosophy, nor is there one of translation. But despitethe claims of sentimental artists, these two are not philistine. For there is aphilosophical genius that is characterized by a yearning for that languagewhich manifests itself in translations. "Les langues imparfaites en cela quep/usieurs, manque la supreme: penser etant ecrire sans accessoires, nichuchotement mais tacite encore l'immortelle parole, la diversite, sur terre,des idiomes empeche personne de proferer les mots qui, sinon se trouveraient, par une fraPtJe unique, elle-meme materiellement La verite."1 Ifwhat Mallarme evokes here is fully fathomable to a philosopher, translation,with its rudiments of such a language, is midway between poetry and theory.Its work is less sharply defined than either of these, but it leaves no less ofa mark on history.

If the task of the translator is viewed in this light, the roads toward asolution seem to be all the more obscure and impenetrable. Indeed, theproblem of ripening the seed of pure language in a translation seems to beinsoluble, determinable in no solution. For is not the ground cut from undersuch a solution if the reproduction of the sense ceases to be decisive? Viewednegatively, this is actually the meaning of all the foregoing. The traditionalconcepts in any discussion of translation are fidelity and license-the free-dom to give a faithful reproduction of the sense and, in its service, fidelityto the word. These ideas seem to be no longer serviceable to a theory thatstrives to find, in a translation, something other than reproduction of mean-ing. To be sure, traditional usage makes these terms appear as if in constantconflict with each other. What can fidelity really do for the rendering ofmeaning? Fidelity in the translation of individual words can almost neverfully reproduce the sense they have in the original. For this sense, in itspoetic significance for the original, is not limited to what is meant but ratherwins such significance to the degree that what is meant is bound to the way


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260 The Task of the Translatorof meaning of the individual word. People commonly convey this when theysay that words have emotional connotations. A literal rendering of thesyntax casts the reproduction of meaning entirely to the winds and threatensto lead directly to incomprehensibility. The nineteenth century consideredHolderlin's translations of Sophocles monstrous examples of such literalness. Finally, it is self-evident how greatly fidelity in reproducing the formimpedes the rendering of the sense. Thus, no case for literalness can be basedon an interest in retaining the meaning. The preservation of meaning isserved far better-and literature and language far worse-by the unrestrained license of bad translators. Of necessity, therefore, the demand forliteralness, whose justification is obvious but whose basis is deeply hidden,must be understood in a more cogent context. Fragments of a vessel thatare to be glued together must match one another in the smallest details,although they need not be like one another. In the same way a translation,instead of imitating the sense of the original, must lovingly and in detailincorporate the original's way of meaning, thus making both the originaland the translation recognizable as fragments of a greater language, just asfragments are part of a vesseL For this very reason translation must in largemeasure refrain from wanting to communicate something, from renderingthe sense, and in this the original is important to it only insofar as it hasalready relieved the translator and his translation of the effort of assemblingand expressing what is to be conveyed. In the realm of translation, too, thewords En archei en ho logos ["In the beginning was the word"] apply. Onthe other hand, as regards the meaning, the language of a translation can-infact, must-let itself go, so that it gives voice to the intentio of the originalnot as reproduction but as harmony, as a supplement to the language inwhich it expresses itself, as its own kind of intentio. Therefore, it is not thehighest praise of a translation, particularly in the age of its origin, to saythat it reads as if it had originally been written in that language. Rather, thesignificance of fidelity as ensured by literalness is that the work reflects thegreat longing for linguistic complementation. A real translation is transparent; it does not cover the original, does not block its light, but allows thepure language, as though reinforced by its own medium, to shine upon theoriginal all the more fully. This may be achieved, above all, by a literalrendering of the syntax which proves words rather than sentences to be theprimary element of the translator. For if the sentence is the wall before thelanguage of the original, literalness is the arcade.

Fidelity and freedom in translation have traditionally been regarded asconflicting tendencies. This deeper interpretation of the one apparently doesnot serve to reconcile the two; in fact, it seems to deny the other alljustification. For what does freedom refer to, if not to the reproduction ofthe sense, which must thereby give up its lawgiving role? Only if the senseof a linguistic creation may be equated with that of the information it


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The Task of the Translator 261conveys does some ultimate, decisive element remain beyond all communication-quite close and yet infinitely remote, concealed or distinguishable,fragmented or powerful. In all language and linguistic creations, thereremains in addition to what can be conveyed something that cannot becommunicated; depending on the context in which it appears, it is somethingthat symbolizes or something symbolized. It is the former only in the finiteproducts of language; the latter, in the evolving of the languages themselves.And that which seeks to represent, indeed to produce, itself in the evolvingof languages is that very nucleus of the pure language; yet though thisnucleus remains present in life as that which is symbolized itself, albeithidden and fragmentary, it persists in linguistic creations only in its symbolizing capacity. Whereas in the various tongues that ultimate essence, thepure language, is tied only to linguistic elements and their changes, inlinguistic creations it is weighted with a heavy, alien meaning. To relieve itof this, to turn the symbolizing into the symbolized itself, to regain purelanguage fully formed from the linguistic flux, is the tremendous and onlycapacity of translation. In this pure language-which no longer means orexpresses anything but is, as expressionless and creative Word, that whichis meant in all languages-all information, all sense, and all intention finallyencounter a stratum in which they are destined to be extinguished. This verystratum furnishes a new and higher justification for free translation; thisjustification does not derive from the sense of what is to be conveyed, forthe emancipation from this sense is the task of fidelity. Rather, freedomproves its worth in the interest of the pure language by its effect on its ownlanguage. It is the task of the translator to release in his own language thatpure language which is exiled among alien tongues, to liberate the languageimprisoned in a work in his re-creation of that work. For the sake of thepure language, he breaks through decayed barriers of his own language.Luther, Voss, H6lderlin, and George have extended the boundaries of theGerman language.-What remains for sense, in its importance for the relationship between translation and original, may be expressed in the followingsimile. Just as a tangent touches a circle lightly and at but one point-establishing, with this touch rather than with the point, the law according towhich it is to continue on its straight path to infinity-a translation touchesthe original lightly and only at the infinitely small point of the sense,thereupon pursuing its own course according to the laws of fidelity in thefreedom of linguistic flux. Without explicitly naming or substantiating it,Rudolf Pannwitz has characterized the true significance of this freedom. Hisobservations are contained in Die Krisis der europiiischen Kultut; and rankwith Goethe's notes to the Westostlicher Divan as the best comment on thetheory of translation that has been published in Germany. Pannwitz writes:"Our translations, even the best ones, proceed from a mistaken premise.


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262 The Task of the TranslatorGerman into Hindi, Greek, English. Our translators have a far greaterreverence for the usage of their own language than for the spirit of theforeign works.... The basic error of the translator is that he preserves thestate in which his own language happens to be instead of allowing hislanguage to be powerfully affected by the foreign tongue. Particularly whentranslating from a language very remote from his own, he must go back tothe primal elements of language itself and penetrate to the point where work,image, and tone converge. He must expand and deepen his language bymeans of the foreign language. It is not generally realized to what extentthis is possible, to what extent any language can be transformed, howlanguage differs from language almost the way dialect differs from dialect.However, this last is true only if one takes language seriously enough, notif one takes it lightly."The extent to which a translation manages to be in keeping with thenature of this form is determined objectively by the translatability of theoriginal. The lower the quality and distinction of its language, the greaterthe extent to which it is information, the less fertile a field it is for translation, until the utter preponderance of content, far from being the lever fora well-formed translation, renders it impossible. The higher the level of awork, the more it remains translatable even if its meaning is touched upononly fleetingly. This, of course, applies to originals only. Translations, incontrast, prove to be untranslatable not because of any inherent difficultybut because of the looseness with which meaning attaches to them. Confirmation of this as well as of every other important aspect is supplied byHolderlin's translations, particularly those of the two tragedies by Sophocles. In them the harmony of the languages is so profound that sense istouched by language only the wayan aeolian harp is touched by the wind.Hblderlin's translations are prototypes of their form; they are to even themost perfect renderings of their texts as a prototype is to a model, as canbe aptly demonstrated by comparing Holderlin's and Rudolf Borchardt'stranslations of Pindar's Third Pythian Ode. For this very reason, Holderlin'stranslations in particular are subject to the enormous danger inherent in alltranslations: the gates of a language thus expanded and modified may slamshut and enclose the translator in silence. Holderlin's translations fromSophocles were his last work; in them meaning plunges from abyss to abyssuntil it threatens to become lost in the bottomless depths of language. Thereis, however, a stop. It is vouchsafed in Holy Writ alone, in which meaninghas ceased to be the watershed for the flow of language and the flow ofrevelation. Where the literal quality of the text takes part directly, withoutany mediating sense, in true language, in the Truth, or in doctrine, this textis unconditionally translatable. To be sure, such translation no longer servesthe cause of the text, but rather works in the interest of languages. This casedemands boundless confidence in the translation, so that just as language


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The Task of the Translator 263and revelation are joined without tension in the original, the translationmust write literalness with freedom in the shape of an interlinear version.For to some degree, all great texts contain their potential translation be-tween the lines; this is true above all of sacred writings. The interlinearversion of the Scriptures is the ptototype or ideal of all translation.Written in 1921; published in Charles Baudelaire, "Tableaux parisiens": Deutsche Ober-tragung mit einem Vorwort uber die Aufgabe des Obersetzers, von Walter Ben;amin[Charles Baudelaire, "Tableaux parisiens": German Translation, with a Foreword on theTask of the Translator, by Walter Benjamin], 1923. Translated by Harry Zohn.

Notes1. "The imperfection of languages consists in their plurality; the supreme language

is lacking: thinking is writing without accessories or even whispering, the immor-tal word still remains silent; the diversity of idioms on earth prevents anyonefrom uttering the words which otherwise, at a single stroke, would materializeas truth."-Trans.

benjamin translator

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